Repositioning Anti-Submarine Warfare

OFF Iceland - This month, NATO navies are coordinating an annual high-level anti-submarine warfare exercise called Dynamic Mongoose 2017. The exercise is led by Allied Maritime Command, with the goal of improving NATO’s anti-submarine warfare coordination and tactics.

Anti-submarine warfare is based on coordinating sonar and electromagnetic sensors from aircraft, helicopters and ships to detect and track adverse submarines. NATO's Allied Command Transformation has been working towards involving unmanned underwater autonomous vehicles in anti-submarine exercises to demonstrate that maritime unmanned systems are new key actors in this battlespace.

The NATO Science and Technology Organization Centre for Maritime Research and Experimentation unmanned underwater autonomous vehicles, along with associated tactical underwater ocean-acoustic prediction systems, will support the exercise by sending real-time data to the Commander for faster decision making. In this exercise, the unmanned underwater autonomous vehicles will also be deployed against the threatening submarines in deeper water.

The exercise marks a step further in transforming anti-submarine warfare. In line with the decisions taken at last year’s Warsaw Summit, it improves NATO navies’ ability to understand, track and anticipate potential adversaries, which in turn provide for timely and efficient political-military decision-making.